Shattered
by justanoutlaw
Summary: After Emma uses her song to ruin the Black Fairy's plan, she hatches a new one. She'll curse Emma to push her parents away. However, she is underestimating one thing: their unconditional love for their daughter.


This was a prompt sent to me by Oncefan123. Since you gave me a choice of villain, I'm setting this as an alternative to Fiona's curse in the season 6 finale. Also, in this, Captain Swan was not a thing, so Emma was still living at her parents' loft. This mentions past abuse. All of the points mentioned were requested by the person who prompted.

* * *

"I guess I'm not alone anymore," Emma told Fiona, adamantly. She had just used the power of the songs her parents had put in her heart to break the spell the wicked villain had cast over them. "Henry, help me out here." Henry stepped forward, helping her put her heart back into her chest.

Fiona's eyes narrowed. "You should've done this the easy way, _savior_ ," she taunted. "Because my curse is still coming and you will be alone for it. The final battle will be worse than you could possibly ever imagine." She flicked her hand and disappeared in a cloud of black smoke.

Snow and David ran to their daughter, pulling her in a big hug. Fiona wouldn't win, they were sure of that.

"How did you do it?" Snow asked.

"It was the song you gave me," Emma told them.

"What song?" David asked.

Emma sniffled, wiping the tears from her eyes. "It doesn't matter. Let's just get out of here."

"Dinner at Granny's?" Henry suggest. Regina nodded, putting an arm around her son.

"That's the best idea I've heard in a while. We will defeat this blasted fairy, one way or another."

Snow nodded, squeezing Emma's shoulder. "Regina's right. Let's go."

The group made their way to Granny's, Snow and David not letting their arms leave Emma the entire time. Even with Regina's promises, they were still worried. Fiona had almost won that night, what if she managed to do it again?

A little later, a waitress was bringing over the beverages for the family. Emma took a big sip of her usual hot chocolate and cinnamon but something felt off.

"This tastes funny," she said.

Snow instantly grabbed the drink. Belle had gone through something similar not a fortnight ago. Emma wasn't pregnant, though. Before anything else could be said, Snow saw something happened to her daughter's eyes. It was something she had only seen once before, back when Ingrid had set the shattered sight curse upon them.

"You," Emma seethed.

"Emma?" David gently asked, putting a hand on her arm, but she yanked away.

"Don't touch me," she told him, sharply. "Don't either of you pretend like you care."

"Mom, what's wrong?" Henry asked. "We just read the book, you know what they did to help you."

"Oh, you're right. Like how they were "helping me" by shoving me into a wardrobe and sending me to some strange land. I thought my family abandoned me. Both families actually, if you count the one that gave me back when I was 3. Something I wouldn't have had to go through if it weren't for them." She glared in the direction of her parents. Before anyone could say anything more, Emma snapped her fingers and disappeared.

David, Henry and Regina all shared a look of confusion. That had all happened so randomly. They knew that Emma had issues with her childhood, but she wasn't one to be so open with them. Especially during a time like that. David noticed his wife didn't look surprised, just heartbroken.

"What is it?"

"I think The Black Fairy did something to her drink," she said, gesturing to the cocoa. "Right after Emma said it tasted weird, it was like her eyes shattered."

A sinking feeling filled David's chest. "The shattered sight curse."

"It has to be a form of it," Regina corrected. "Ingrid took all of it away when she killed herself."

"Why would she do this?"

"She wants Emma to be alone when she fights the final battle, this is one way to do it. She thinks if Emma lashes out at you two, you'll push her away."

"Well she's wrong," Snow said, getting up from the table, hoisting Neal onto her hip. "I am not going to lose my daughter. I don't care what happens."

David nodded in agreement, getting up from the table. Together, they walked out of the diner and headed back down the sidewalk to the loft. They knew it was where Emma would go. If anything, she'd be trying to leave-not that that they'd let that happen.

As it turned out, their parental intuition was right. They caught Emma storming down the steps, suitcase in hand. Snow lowered Neal into his crib and grabbed hold of her daughter's arm while David blocked the door.

"Let me go!" Emma barked at her mom.

"No, we aren't going to let you go, Emma. You were cursed, you don't really hate us."

Emma scoffed. "Curses, you'd sure know a lot about those, wouldn't you? Hell, didn't you only drag me back from New York so I could break one and save your precious baby?"

"Emma…"

"No! Did you even care or try to find a way back to Henry and I or just you just want to replace us with the new baby?"

"You know that's not true," David said, softly. "We missed both of you every single day, but we couldn't ruin your happiness."

"Until you needed me, right?" She pulled away from Snow. "I could've married that stupid flying monkey and neither of you would've done anything to protect me!"

"We wish we could've," her mother tried to explain. "It's all we've ever wanted to do."

"Yeah, right! That's why you sucked the innocence out of a child, right? You couldn't even trust that I'd turn out I'd turn out good, could you? You never do. When I had the darkness in me, you couldn't even save me! Yet you could save Neal from Zelena?!"

David and Snow knew this wasn't Emma, not really. Some of the emotions were truly hers, but she didn't truly feel this upset with them. They remembered the curse and how much they were convinced they hated each other. Even so, Emma's words cut deep. They weren't sure how much of this she'd remember after the spell faded away and they wanted her to know how they truly felt.

"We've made mistakes," Snow said, softly. "We know that."

"Oh, so the Queen of Perfection finally admits that she screwed up. Funny how you only do it when things go haywire. Like all those times when Ingrid was around. You were afraid of me! You weren't by my side!"

Snow bit her lip. "I know I wasn't. I wish I had been."

"Well it's not as if it's anything new. My whole life, I was an orphan! I was bounced around from home to home. Some I was lucky to have food in, others I was fortunate enough not to get hit! All I had was my stupid blanket! I didn't understand why the two of you would put my name on it, how you could care at some point, but not anymore!"

"We did care," Snow whispered, her voice just barely audible enough.

"Well how the hell was I to know that? I ran away a lot. One time in particular, because I saw this little girl being adopted. I realize no one would ever look at me the way they did her! I cried myself to sleep every night, because I wanted my parents so badly. Then I finally get them and what happens? They promise me that they'll be my parents, that everything will be okay. But it wasn't, because not 5 seconds later you two were making plans for a new baby!"

"We never meant to do that in front of you, Emma," David interrupted. "We were in the Echo Cave, we had to say those things, we didn't have any control over it. Just like you don't have control right now."

"What about what you did have control over? Like when I was trying to tell you that Tamara was dangerous and all Mom said was that I was jealous and all you…" She pointed to David. "Gave a damn about was harvesting beans. You just wanted to leave again!"

David stepped away from his place at the door, putting his hand on top of Emma's. He wasn't fazed when she pulled away from him, he didn't care.

"I'm not going to leave," he told her. "I never wanted to leave you, I wanted to bring you to where you'd be safe, where you could have your happy ending."

"We should've listened to you about Tamara, we wish we had," Snow frowned. "We'll never forgive ourselves. Maybe we could've prevented Henry being kidnapped."

"Just like you did a great job protecting us in the past. Because you two weren't around, I was running around on the streets, alone! I had to sleep in stolen cars, under bridges. I had to steal to eat, if I could find anything at all! I met a guy who I loved so much and ended up in jail, pregnant with his baby. A baby I loved more than anything but I couldn't keep because I didn't know how to be a mother! I wonder why that is."

Tears brimmed Snow's eyes. Every day she felt a pang of guilt knowing that her baby girl had to go through what she did all those years ago. It was almost like a rule in their family that no one was allowed to raise all the children they gave birth to. Ruth had to give away James, Snow sent Emma away to be safe and Emma placed Henry for adoption. It was a vicious circle, a terrible one. Everyone always said that "I will always find you" was their family's mantra, but "We have to give them their best chance" seemed to be it too.

Her daughter had been through so much trauma in her life. She knew that they couldn't go back and change it, they also knew Emma wouldn't want that. The pain she went through, it made her who she was. She wouldn't change Emma for the world, the whole Ingrid fiasco had taught her that much.

"I'm not even your daughter, am I?"

"That's ridiculous, of course you are," David said, his brows crinkling.

"How do I know you're not using me? Or Henry? We have magic, I'm the savior! He's the author. We can solve all your problems, but do you really love us?"

"Emma, yes, we love both of you more than anything. You know that we would love you with or without your powers," Snow stepped closer to her. "This is the curse getting in your head. We love you just the way you are, no matter what that version is. We've been through this before."

"How am I meant to know that? You two have a new baby now, a normal one. Do you two even realize how hard it is for me to see you two with him?" She kicked a chair, causing it to fall over. "He's everything you ever wanted, Dad especially. You always wanted a son, right? You were probably relieved you finally had your precious son."

"I never cared that you were a girl," David bit his lip. "Yes, I said I wanted a son, but if you read the book closely, you'd see that my mom also told yours that a girl would be just as fine. I just wanted a family, a chance to be a father. That's what I got and I wouldn't trade you for anything."

Emma shook her head and they could tell everything was coming to a head. The rational side of Emma, the part of her knew that most of this wasn't true, was trying to break through. The other side, the orphan, was clinging to the part that she was alone, thinking she had no one who cared about her. The curse wanted her to believe that she was unloved, that her parents wanted Neal more. It wanted her to push them away, so she'd go back to being alone. Yet, the other side was saying no. She wasn't alone. Not anymore. Her parents did love her. They had messed up a few times, but overall, they were trying. It was a complicated situation, one they had to find a new way to navigate every day and they would.

The two voices just became too much. She felt as though she was the Dark One again, with Rumple haunting her mind over and over. She fell to her knees, sobbing.

"I'm sorry I'm not princess enough," she croaked out.

Before Snow and David could react, Emma found herself in a panic attack and slipped out of consciousness. They kneeled beside her, David cradling the back of her head so it wouldn't be on the hardwood floor. Both kissed the top of her head and they could see a rainbow ripple go over. The curse was broken, but just as last time, the words couldn't be taken back. Yes, some of that had been just the curse, but there was truth there. Emma had been alone for the first 28 years. She had been selfless and brave to give up Henry, but it was something she wouldn't have had to do if they had raised her.

David lifted her into his arms and carried her to their bed so she could rest properly. Snow laid beside Emma, stroking her hair and looking down at her. She had meant what she said to Emma in Neverland.

" _You were an orphan, it's my job to fix it."_

Years later and it was still true. They may have had Neal, but she was still their baby. There was nothing they wouldn't do for her.

David sat in a chair by the bed, watching her as well. He couldn't have asked for a better daughter. She was so much like both of them, with her own bits fixed in. A son had never been important, if he had 10 daughters, that would've been fine too. He had loved Emma from the minute he knew she was coming and that day in Rumple's dungeon, when he discovered the truth, it didn't make him love her any less. Having Neal didn't change that. He had two beautiful children that he would die for (and he had, once for each of them).

It took a few hours, but Emma eventually woke up. She could see that both of her parents had been crying and she felt like she had to. Her memory was foggy, the last she could remember was having their family dinner at Granny's. She started to sit up, Snow jumping into help her.

"Easy now, you passed out," she said, calmly.

"Here, slow sips," David pushed a glass of water into her hands and watched as she complied.

"What happened?" Emma asked. "Why were you two crying?"

"The Black Fairy, she spiked your drink with a smaller version of the Shattered Sight. You…you had a lot to say to us." He bit his lip. "You blamed us for having to give Henry up, you said you didn't think we loved you the same as Neal, that we only wanted you for your powers. You brought up Lily and Neverland…"

"Emma, you have to know how much we love you," Snow interrupted. "We know we've made a lot of mistakes and there's no excusing that. We never meant for you to hear what you did in Neverland, if it weren't for the Echo Cave, you never would've. Having Neal, it doesn't change how much we love you."

"You're my baby girl and I was never disappointed that you weren't a boy. Having Neal didn't replace you or make me any happier than you made me," David added. "You just have to know…"

"Whoa, whoa, guys," Emma held up her hand. She would've laughed had the situation not been so serious. "I know all of this, I really do. I know you love me. The Echo Cave, it was horrible, yes, but I know you'd never hurt me. Same with all that happened when Ingrid was in town. Mom, you messed up, but you apologized enough for that. You both have, for whenever you've made mistakes. I know you're human. That was the curse talking, you know that. Don't you remember that Dad accused you of Neal being Whale's? We know he doesn't really think that."

Snow nodded, slowly. "But there were things you said that weren't the curse. You being alone your whole life, your childhood…Emma, we…we wish we could've been there."

Emma sighed. There were things that she never told her parents, she never wanted them to hear. Thanks to the Black Fairy, that was all out now. She took both of her parents' hands and looked between them.

"I know. I wish you could've, too. The truth is, yeah, I went through a lot of stuff. It's nothing that you two can make up for and I know asking you not to feel bad about it, isn't realistic. Just know that I know that you love me. I love both of you, so much. You two have done so much for me, you've fought for me since the moment the curse broke. Hell, Mom, you were doing it before that happened. You were my first best friend since Lily." She smiled at David. "And you taught me how amazing a man can really be. You taught me what it is to feel safe. I wouldn't change our family for the world."

David and Snow pulled her into their arms, hugging her as tightly as possible. Emma would've thought to make a joke about being able to breathe, but instead just wrapped her arms around them tightly. She shut her eyes, relishing in the embrace. The Black Fairy had tried to isolate her once again and leave her alone. She had just underestimated one thing: how deep her parents' unconditional love was.

* * *

I hope you guys enjoyed this. As always, prompts are accepted on my Tumblr accounts: just-an-outlaw and justanoutlawfanfiction!


End file.
